UFO - Reflections in the Water

RitW made my brain feel fuzzy.

There's trouble in one particular stretch of water. A commercial ship has been blown apart by what the crew reported as 'flying fish', a film crew has had one of it's divers killed by a slashed air hose, and unusually warm currents are diverting marine life from their usual habitats. Fortunately for Earth, the film crew happens to be under contract at Harlington/Straker and their director a stupefyingly boring man with a keen eye.

I guess those flying fish set the tone for the whole story. Are they cool, or absurd, or some cruel joke played on victims? Basically, they're missiles that shoot lasers instrad of actually hitting their targets. Oops, missed! PSYCH, no we didnt! Na-na-nana-na! UFOs already have laser weapons, so why be so elaborate? Why, because its fun!

At this point the narrative needle skips its groove with a montage of clips previewing the rest of the story. UFO's production team was experimenting with the lesser credits format and someone must have liked it because it would become a staple of Space: 1999's title credits. Not being used to it on UFO, it's momentarily confusing.

Skydiver investigates and finds a UFO plying a route along a cable powering an underwater dome. Straker and Foster don scuba gear and check the place out, finding that its walls are accommodatingly transparent (always handy if you're trying to keep a secret, much like blowing up every ship that passes overhead).

Peering in, they spot one of their own: one Lt. Anderson. Traitor! Or he could just be under mental control, if he weren't such a lying traitor. Back on Skydiver, Straker orders its captain to maintain his position surveilling the dome - he'll be in contact when he gets back to HQ. This was the first instance where I felt my mind slipping, and it wouldn't be the last. Suddenly I needed to rewind the entire block and see it again...surely I'd been mentally wandering and missed some crucial line of dialog? How are Straker and Foster returning to HQ if Skydiver isn't taking them? Sky 1 seats one, and it's not a taxi service. Had they rendezvoused with another Skydiver or some other vessel? Are they going to swim back?

It happened again not long after. There's Anderson, that sickening traitor, smiling at them all innocent-like. Straker straps him up for a third degree. Expert grilling technique, that, consisting of shouting a single question at him denial after denial. Even after two doses of truth serum, Anderson insists he doesn't have a clue what Straker and Foster are on about. Y'know, SHADO personnel have been known to succumb to alien brainwashing - well, sure, you could excuse an innocent person that way but not a lousy traitor. What cheek, pretending his honor has been hurt.

Frustrated, Straker demands the psych evaluation be rushed into his hands. That's Col. Lake's job. Surely the evaluation will explain why Anderson has turned on SHADO...but it doesn't. It's a rather terse reply, almost snide...and there I went again, needing to rewind. I watched the scene three times. Was it the computer that made the analysis (as has happened before) or a doctor such as Jackson (also standard SHADO procedure)? Wasn't Lake, yet she's the one who put forward the questions. She's approached them as many different ways as she can think to, and the answer is always the same. Yes, that's what happens when you're trying to squeeze a computer to yield more than it's programmed with. Yet, I don't recall UFO ever mentioning before that its computer not only has an artificial personality but one that's cranky. That's what it's like to work under Straker, he even pisses off the machinery. Lake knows the feeling well. She's the only one (besides HAL) with the guts to snap at him. Even SID knows better.

Straker and Foster return to the dome. Discovering that it's housed in some wonderful self-sealing skin, they enter to find that the UFO has been there. I'd been wondering about that, as we know they don't last long in our atmosphere, and it's surmised in The Sound of Silence that immersion in water doesn't help. So, now we know the craft doesn't remain in the ocean but rests in the dome. But it's still in an oxygen-rich site, so...? Oh, well, back to the plot.

In the dome they find more SHADO personnel, including themselves. Also Anderson again, who is locked in a cell back at HQ. Aha, thinks Straker, it's plastic surgery. Personally, I leapt immediately to clones and thought that Straker must not have seen enough science fiction TV shows, but no - he's right, it's not clones. If the aliens figured out how to clone bodies, they'd have no more need to raid Earth.

Exploring further (and with the clock ticking, orders having been left to torpedo the dome in exactly an hour), they find a replica of SHADO HQ, wherein they espy their duplicates lipsynching to voice recordings of the genuine SHADO agents. We learned early in the episode that the aliens have mounted an ambitious invasion plan with a force of at least twenty-five UFOs standing by. Now the plan is revealed: when the fleet makes a go for Earth, all defense forces will be ordered to stand down...and they'll do it, too, because they know that Straker has a penchant for wild, suicidal gambits that always pay off.

Not to worry. Straker and Foster blow the joint, figuratively and literally, and when the assault launches it is ably if improbably fought off. We never learn how the aliens intended to neutralize SHADO HQ, which they would have had to do for their own fake to be effective. There's also a question raised about the Interceptors taking out four UFOs - watch the editing, we see exactly three missiles fired. I've always wondered about those three nozzles mounted fore of the visor - are they weapons or thrusters? I still don't know.

Oh, and all's cool between Straker and Anderson, the traitorous bastard, it's all smiles and backslaps. So that's okay then.

This was just plain fun, and I give it 7 "Damn dome!"s and other alliterate outbursts.
The score - no, the musical score - included a short burst heavy on brass that sounded like the standard villain's cue on the '66 Batman. Because it occurred while onboard Skydiver, I thought Burgess Meredith was about to enter quacking.